Robstown's 'Toy Bowl' raises donations

Thursday

Dec 24, 2009 at 12:01 AM

By Anthony Ruiz

Members of the Robstown police, fire and EMS departments, along with employees of Robstown Utilities Systems, got together to play their annual flag football "Toy Bowl" to raise donations for the "Toys for Tots" charity drive.

"The CGA is doing a collection for us also," event coordinator Filiberto Tagle said. "They weren't able to come out (for the football game) because of a previous schedule, but they have their own toys that they are collecting with whatever we bring in."

Now in its fourth year, the Toy Bowl has grown from just featuring a City versus Utilities game. The event also features flag football games from four girls teams: the Lady Jets, the Soldier Girls, the Pink Panthers and Sugar & Spice.

"We added in the girls two years ago," Tagle said. "It has improved a lot. In fact, we have more girls teams (this year) than we have guy teams."

This year, the Lady Jets defeated the Soldier Girls 23-22. The other two girls teams were forced to forfeit due to lack of available players.

In the Toy Bowl, the Utilities went on to defeat the city 29-16.

As for toy donations, Tagle said that they more than met expectations this year. While they planned to raise enough toys to provide gifts for 20 families, the event was successful enough that Tagle is looking to add 10 more families to the amount. Tagle said that last year, the event brought in enough toys for about 15 families.

"The people who showed up brought gifts and everybody who participated in the football games donated as well," Tagle said.

Tagle said the gifts would be delivered on Dec. 22 and members of the Robstown police, EMS and fire departments, along with Santa Clause, will help in the deliveries.

Tagle said that he plans to continue with the Toy Bowl next year and has already received interest from more organizations that want to participate, such as the Kingsville Sheriff's Department.

"Hopefully next year it'll be bigger and better," he said.

Tagle said he would like to thank all who donated and and helped to make the Toy Bowl a success this year.